AN old photo on Francois Serneels’ phone captures what is, for him, a familiar scene: a field study in China with Belgian students. In the image, a group of these students walks through a greenhouse on the outskirts of Chongqing, China, fields of tender seedlings stretching out beneath their feet.

Leading them is Serneels, a Belgian agronomist affectionately nicknamed “Dr. Bethune of Potato.” This moniker harks back to the Canadian surgeon Norman Bethune, who became a hero in China for his dedication to the Chinese people’s fight against Japanese aggression in 1938.

Over the past two decades, Serneels has crossed continents more than 60 times, tirelessly traveling into China’s rural heartlands to help Chinese farmers grow better potatoes and train the next generation of agronomists. He often brings Belgian students or fellow scientists along.

Serneels likens his connection to China to a childhood comic book adventure. “My story with China is a little like Tintin’s,” Serneels said, referring to “The Blue Lotus,” a classic Belgian comic he read as a child. “In the story, a young reporter goes to China and becomes friends with a Chinese guy. I visited China later in life and can say my best friend is a Chinese guy.”

That friend is Che Xingbi, an agronomist from Chongqing. Their friendship began in 1999 when Serneels went to Beijing for the first China International Agricultural Expo and the first International Conference on Plant Protection. There, he presented on a predictive system developed by the Hainaut Provincial Research Center in Belgium that helps farmers combat potato late blight — a fast-spreading disease that devastates potato crops.

“To my surprise, a lot of Chinese agronomists were very interested,” he says. He then realized that he had been wrong to think that the potato was just a Western staple. China was — and remains — the world's biggest potato producer.

Che was among the ones who were intrigued and he invited Serneels to Wuxi, a remote mountainous region in northeastern Chongqing where local farmers were struggling with repeated outbreaks of the disease. The Belgian system proved transformative.

In the years that followed, potato yields in Wuxi rose significantly, and the humble tuber became a pillar of local poverty alleviation efforts. Today, the system is used in around 16 provincial-level regions in China, helping farmers avoid major losses.

Che credits much of this success to Serneels’ professionalism and dedication. Jiang Ning, another close friend of Serneels and a professor at the University of Mons in Belgium, recounted an anecdote about Serneels in which his luggage did not arrive during a trip to Hulunbuir in Inner Mongolia.

The first item Serneels purchased to replace his missing belongings was a pair of high-top rubber boots — essential equipment for fieldwork. “That choice showed Francois’s focus on getting the job done,” Jiang said.

From bilateral success to global benefit

Their cooperation on this system, already in use for years in China, fed back into the method Serneels and his Belgian colleagues used to approach agricultural technology back home.

Belgium’s original warning system for potato late blight was largely manual. “Farmers used to go to the weather stations, note down the temperature and rainfall, and call the scientists by phone,” Serneels explained. “We would then draw curves and analyze how the blight is developing manually. By 1999, only basic automation of the system had been achieved.”

Such methods were impractical in China given the country’s vast agricultural areas. That challenge prompted Serneels’ Chinese partners to develop advanced computing and data transmission systems to fully automate the process. “We designed the first system, but we got back a much more powerful version from China,” Serneels said. “It was real win-win cooperation.”

That upgraded version is now also in use in Rwanda, Guinea, and Bangladesh. Serneels calls this expansion “the cherry on the cake” and “a very interesting example of shared progress for humanity.”

With the world confronting urgent challenges, including climate change, food insecurity, and energy shortages, Serneels said he believes such collaboration is essential. “Europe has advanced research, and China has vast fields for application and innovation. Put together, as we did with the potato system, we can achieve great things.”

Field study builds understanding

Having witnessed the transformation of rural China firsthand, Serneels is passionate about showing his students these changes. Almost every year, he organizes rural immersion trips to China for Belgian students, sometimes leading groups of up to 57 participants.

Guillaume De Vriendt, a student from Condorcet University, said he had discovered a China largely unfamiliar to most Westerners and often misrepresented by stereotypes.

Serneels said he believes that personal experience is the key to deeper understanding. “Only by seeing rural China, staying a few days, and meeting local students, farmers, and scientists can they begin to understand the real China.”

As a result of these trips, more than 20 of his students have returned to China for extended internships or research projects.

Because of his outstanding contribution Serneels has been awarded several times by both the Chongqing government and the Chinese Government.

At the Chinese embassy in Brussels in November 2022, he received the Chinese Government Friendship Award. Receiving the award with him were two of his compatriots, Johan Erauw, an emeritus professor of law at Ghent University, and Jacques Crommen, an emeritus professor at the University of Liege known for his work on traditional Chinese medicine.

He believes that recognizing commonalities is key to lasting collaboration across borders. To this end, Serneels often compares cheese and tofu.

“In Europe, we have hundreds of cheeses. In China, many kinds of tofu. Cheese is transformed milk. Tofu is transformed soy protein. The tastes differ, but both are symbolic and nutrient-rich,” he said.

On the eve of another trip to China with a new group of students, Serneels offered a simple blessing in Mandarin, “yi lu ping’an,” which means safe journey. For him, it was more than a farewell — it was also a quiet hope for the future of China-EU relations.

“China and the EU have a long road ahead,” he said. “But by walking it together, we can build a more stable, trusting, and fruitful partnership — a journey like a well-tended field that promises a lasting harvest of friendship and progress.” (Xinhua)